Gravida's annual Science Symposium on 9-10 September 2013 took attendees through five session blocks, theming the scientific talks into environmental influences, cellular-level mechanisms and pregnancy and programming on Day One, before moving downstream to clinical interventions and translation on Day Two.
Day One began with a comprehensive case made by Professor Sir Peter Gluckman about the significance of DOHaD research (Developmental Origins of Health and Disease), including a critical look at why this science has had a rocky road to widespread health policy acceptance.
Following sessions then went into current research directions being undertaken by Gravida members in obesity and its developmental influences, hormones and how they are affected by environmental factors and contribute to development, and the increasingly topical area of microbiota, intestinal gut flora and new discoveries about their implications for life long health and development. Professor Lesley McCowan announced a new clinical trial investigating the role of probiotics and joint research with the Riddet Institute was also presented, cementing this new direction of research into the minds of the audience.
Associate Professor Mark Hampton's talk also neatly illustrated how science knowledge continues to evolve, explaining that over the past 10 years of the CoRE, research has begun to show that oxidative stress should no longer be thought of as a process that simply causes damage, but rather as a process that influences signalling. Some free radicals in the body play important roles in processes, he explained, and current thinking suggests that antioxidant supplements should only be used to help support natural body processes.
Other Day One sessions explained current animal studies taking place to provide more evidence for cellular-level processes and programming. A human tissue study of placentas, looking for cellular-level DNA damage caused by smoking, rounded off the sessions.
By the end of the day, a general consensus was reached amongst the audience and speakers that the presentations had highlighted a common theme of gender-specific data in many of the studies. As an action point, several researchers noted this was an interesting direction for their future studies to pursue.
Day Two began with a whirlwind overview of the next generation of scientists' PhD work (though the medium of 90-second bus-stop talks) before moving into several new examples of clinical interventions and trials resulting from promising evidence-based research. Professor Frank Bloomfield used his session to explain a best-practice roadmap for how research should progress into a clinical trial, by explaining the journey taken by his team when investigating the use of insulin for hyperglycaemia in babies.
Several sessions then focused on agriculture, explaining that research findings on fetal programming may also yield benefits for farmers looking for ways to maximise productivity and animal health on the farm. However, because the farm environment and its workers are so different from a clinical setting, any proposed interventions will have to be practical, cost-effective and able to be carried out by a farmer often working for great periods on his own. New research that identifies for the first time how farmers learn and pick up new farming methods was also presented –information that will clearly help inform the success of future translation efforts.
Another session by Jacquie Bay also recapped the success of Gravida's long-term support of LENScience, an education outreach programme that is being proven to result in long-term behaviour change in adolescents. Jacquie was able to show that her programme is gaining recognition around the world – presenting another leadership bow to 's string in the DOHaD field of science.
To view a full list of all the Gravida Science Symposium sessions and speakers, click here.
To view the photo gallery from the symposium, click here.
Webcasts of the science sessions will be loaded online shortly.